Director Ted Jaquith dishes on Driftwood Player’s Festival of Shorts

I stopped by Revelations Yogurt to talk to Ted Jaquith about the Driftwood Players’ 2nd Annual Festival of Shorts, which runs this coming Friday and Saturday, July 8 and 9, at the Wade James Theatre on Main Street. (Showtime is 8 p.m. Call 425-774-9600 for tickets.)

This is Jaquith’s second year as a director of “Shorts.” This year he also served on the reading committee.

“Playwrights submit 10- to 15-minute plays that fit the theme,” he said. “This year’s theme was ‘Second Chances.’” The shows must be original, never produced before and have little or no set/props.

Jaquith said that playwrights submitted about 30 entries this year, and he “really enjoyed the process.” The committee received almost 90 entries last year, which was a lot of reading, he added.

“Last year we had one director per show, but this year there are four directors for seven plays,” he said.

Jaquith is directing two shows — “Love” by David Alan Morrison and “Time Traveler’s Remorse” by Craig Jessen. Morrison is also directing one of the other shorts.

““Love” is about four characters on cell phones. They are all having conversations and there is confusion about who is talking to whom,” Jaquith said. “David is great. He doesn’t look over my shoulder but I can ask him anything. I am eager to see what he thinks of what we did with his words”.

“Time Traveler’s Remorse” is a love story set in 1612 in London. “There is a big story going on and this is just a small part of that,” he said.

An Edmonds resident for 30 years, Jaquith has been seen on the Driftwood stage in “Musical Comedy Murders of 1940” (September 2010) and will be directing “Legend of Sleepy Hollow” this October.

“Acting gives you immediate feedback from the audience, but I like directing because I am the one making the decisions,” he said.

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